Had a 'oh crap' moment today that actually turned out alright.
Mowed the worst of my clients properties yesterday with the 2186. It excelled at the steep grades and tall grass, but after that lawn I decided that I was going to change the hydro filter, even if it had been changed at 100 hrs by previous owner (still waiting on verification of this, btw).
So, this morning my daughter and I went to the dealer, got our 15.00 723-3014 filter for the BDU 10/21 hydro. Got home and immediately got working on it. Didn't remove deck or put it on ramps, just did it on the floor. Easy system to work on, really. So...finally got the filter to break loose with a strap wrench, and I saw some fluid starting to run out behind the filter. "Ok," I thought, "that's just whats in the filter." Nope! Loosened it again, and it came pouring out. Then I thought bout where the fluid level had to be when it was on the dipstick, and realized it was way above the level of the filter housing.
So I tried to finagle swapping the new filter on there before I lost all the fluid, to no avail. I knew how expensive their "Drive System Fluid Plus" was, so I was cussing up a storm. Didn't really have over a hundred spare bucks just layin around to get the Cub back together. I moped around for a while, then did some research.
Long story short, I went with some Rotella 5w-40 Synthetic. A third of the price of the Cub fluid, and I still have a quart or so left over from the two jugs I bought. After I cooled down, I had the presence of mind to set my old oil filter to drain into a clean container, so I could inspect the old fluid. Brought over a shop light and inspected the fluid. It was a darker color when compared to the one quart of new Drive System I had bought weeks ago, but that didn't concern me as much as the light metallic sheen it had under a light.
So glad I lost all the old fluid and replaced it. Now I have some peace of mind.
Thanks for listening.
Justin
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